Brock et al. found that a Pivotal Response Training program facilitated by school staff and implemented by peers increased peer interaction and appropriate play in school-age children with autism.

Kelley et al. add to the evidence base for the Story Friends curriculum, which targets vocabulary and reading comprehension for 4- to 6-year-olds with limited oral language, and which can be used as a Tier 2 intervention in an RtI framework. The researchers found that by analyzing scores from Unit 1 (roughly one month of instruction), they could predict which children would respond to the program as a whole and who would require more specialized, Tier 3 interventions.

Kuster et al. found that the Dyslexie font did not improve children’s reading speed or accuracy (whether or not they had dyslexia), and that the readers didn’t prefer it to traditional fonts.

Na et al. introduce an interview-based assessment tool to help SLPs gather culturally-relevant data about the emotional competence of young AAC users, while learning about the family’s priorities and values around expressing emotions. A small pilot study showed that American and Korean-American respondents gave qualitatively different responses to the questions, as predicted.